Then and Now: The Reality of New BeginningsBy: Shauna Stubbs, RHYTTAC Principal Investigator for National Safe Place Network

Human beings tote baggage around everywhere we go. Sometimes we hold that heaviness inside and struggle to let it go. Experiences of disappointment, pain and loss teach us to survive by limiting expectations, eliminating vulnerability, and disconnecting from others. Other times that baggage gets stuck in the environment around us. Failing an assignment at school colors a teacher’s perception of a student’s potential. A mistake at work results in colleagues or supervisors doubting a young person’s reliability. A common but destructive error in judgment breaks a parent’s trust and makes it difficult for a youth to restore it.

For those of us who work with runaway and homeless youth, it isn’t hard to see how such baggage might trigger a chain of events and reactions that could ultimately lead a young person to isolation, hopelessness, and life on the streets. Knowing how important both resilience and relationships are to positive outcomes for runaway and homeless youth, we have an opportunity to encourage youth, families, and communities to explore such challenges from a different perspective.

Change is hard for any of us. Feeling pressure to change makes it harder. Working to change in the face of expectations that we will fail can make the odds seem insurmountable. Our youth and families experience these struggles every day. Coping skills that cause harm are difficult to replace. Unsupportive communication patterns are hard to break. We who serve runaway and homeless youth recognize those challenges, and we know that pushing through them can produce extraordinary results.

As RHY service providers, our knowledge and experience uniquely equip us to help youth and families navigate these changes. Here are a few of the ways we can help:

Normalize these experiences. Help youth and families see that they are not alone.

Facilitate realistic expectations. Don’t set families up to fail. Help them recognize that old patterns were practiced for a long time, and it may take some time to practice newer ones.